Announcer: This episode of the Miami PI Chronicles podcast is brought to you by the law offices of Richard E. Basha and Associates, specializing in all aspects of commercial, civil, business law and litigation. Their office is located in the Bank of America building, located at 401 East Las Olas Boulevard, Suite 1400, Fort Lauderdale, Florida, 33301. For a free consultation, please call 954 523 4882. That is 954 523 4882. For all your investigative needs, please call McKinnon Investigative Group at 954 513 7414. That is 954 513 7414. Or email us at miginvestigations at outlook.com.
Francois McKinnon: Welcome to the Miami PI Chronicles podcast. I am your host, Francois McKinnon from McKinnon Investigative Group.
Oscar Santamaria: And I am Oscar Santamaria of Optimum Investigations.
Francois McKinnon: We created this podcast with the goal to educate, inform, and entertain aspiring beginner and seasoned professionals in the investigative field. With over 60 years of combined experience, we offer invaluable insights and lessons learned. While we may not have all the answers, our knowledge can certainly benefit anyone interested in this dynamic profession. So sit back, listen, and enjoy these episodes. Please do not forget to like, share, and follow. Hello, Francois. How are you doing?
Oscar Santamaria: Hey, Oscar. How is it going, man?
Francois McKinnon: Oh, not too bad. Not too bad. I was thinking about today’s show, and today marks a pretty big milestone for us. It is our 10th episode. I would just like to go back with maybe some of our newer listeners and talk about some of the things that we spoke about the first previous nine and why we started this, what our journeys were to get here, and just to have a little bit of a recap.
Oscar Santamaria: Let’s go ahead and do that, my friend. Some of the shows that we have done, if people have not seen the show yet or heard the show, because now we are going to be on YouTube, so they can just go to Miami PI Chronicles podcast on YouTube, and they will be able to see who we are. The things we went over are pretty much what private investigators that are professional like us have done. I think between you and I, we have 62 years of investigations and a lot of knowledge that we want to share, which is part of why we created this show, to help out professionals, newcomers, beginners at this, people who are intrigued about what we do for a living, because a lot of people have no clue.
Francois McKinnon: Exactly. What you are saying is that when we were starting out, it was a struggle. There was not really a lot of people that we could reach out to. I did not have really anybody that I trusted that could mentor me. I think as stewards of this profession, not professing that we have all the answers, but we have learned something along the way, is to impart that knowledge in some of the less experienced investigators, and not make this such a lonely process, because it can be scary at times.
Oscar Santamaria: Sometimes in this business, I have always said that it is feast or famine. Sometimes things have been really, really slow, and then some things have been overwhelmingly just too much work at one time, and then it is never a happy medium. That is how it was for a lot of years, and clients come and go. Some people retire. Some people die. I have seen that happen quite a few times in my over 30 year career.
Francois McKinnon: Well, not even before then, but you know. It is time for us to pass on the torch, and try to help out others, as well as inform and entertain our listeners. I think so far, we have had a great time, you and I, and people are loving this show for some reason. I do not know why, but so be it. Some of the things we spoke about, and maybe to recap a little bit of our 10th show, we did report writing. How important it is to have great report writing. Also getting good video.
Oscar Santamaria: Yeah, two very important topics. I think that report writing is really your final product. You can do everything right in the field. You can follow people. You can go from place to place to place to place to place, get great quality video, but when you submit the report, it has got all sorts of mistakes. It lessens what you have done. The report is one of the most important things that you have. That is what your client is going to see before they look at any video. They are going to read through your report, read through your summary, look at the pictures if you include those. And so you have to make sure that it is not sloppy, that you dot your I’s and you cross your T’s. Take your time. If you are not very good grammatically, get somebody that can proofread it for you. Throw it through ChatGPT and have them correct it for you, but just do not put something out there that is sloppy. If there are addresses, you want to make sure you put the complete address, the name of the business that a claimant may have gone to and include the zip code. Just attention to detail and never overlook the importance of a good report. Do not rely solely on the video and the results that you might get because you need to communicate that to your client. And the way you are going to do that is through a report.
Francois McKinnon: But Oscar, we also discussed how important it is to get great video, which means non shaky, properly done, the subject centered, and have a great video to be able to present because a lot of the times our work goes into court and you do not want to not be sure, as an example, if it is not the right subject because the video is so poor quality. And you and I discussed before between sensors, objects, and you had discussed this before. Tell us a little bit about it. Tell the audience about how all of these expensive cameras that we use these days are fully automatic, yet there is a way to set them on manual and then focus.
Oscar Santamaria: Video is very important. So what you really want to do is you want to get a face shot, get a good recognition that the person that you are filming is actually the claimant, but then you want to back off. You want to keep it to head to toe. You want to keep the subject, their full body, how they move, their range of motion, how fast they go, how they get in and out of vehicles. Once you get that face shot, do not start zooming in and zooming out. I would suggest everybody, anything over a few minutes of video, to use a tripod or a monopod to keep the video as steady as possible because you do start shaking. If you have glare through the windows that is coming off of the dashboard, what you want to do is put something dark like a black shirt or a black towel on the dashboard and that will eliminate a lot of that glare. You want to keep your windows clean. You want to know when to put your camera from automatic focus to manual focus. Oftentimes when your cameras come with a default of automatic focus and if your windows are dirty, if there are objects coming in between you and the claimant, if you are shooting through a fence, the automatic focus is going to put everything blurry. If it is raining and you have little drops on your phone, if it is nighttime and you have the lights of vehicles, that is all going to put your video out of focus. So you have to know how to put it to manual focus. If you put it to manual focus, what you want to do is you want to zoom it all the way in when it is on automatic focus and when it is all the way in and it is a clear steady shot, you want to move it to manual focus and then that will keep everything pretty much in focus. Generally speaking, sometimes if you are a little bit too close, it may not be as in focus but it is going to be a lot better than having it coming in and coming out. You have to know when to use automatic and manual focus. So yeah, video is important and just understand the camera and what you need to do. Also keep your windows clean.
Francois McKinnon: We also discussed on previous shows surveillance techniques, how to grow your business. We spoke about an interesting criminal case with attorney Jonathan Friedman and also lastly the show number nine, The Lady in the Suitcase, which was a fascinating case and we got so many emails regarding that because it is an actual case that happened in Miami and we are the Miami PI Chronicles. It was pretty interesting to revisit an investigation that my friend had done such a great, fantastic job on it and I just thought that we would discuss it and people loved it. It is a horrible crime but his investigative skills pushed so far beyond that he was able to get this monster off the street. I am very glad that we were able to share this with our audience.
Oscar Santamaria: Yes, that was certainly a master class in investigative techniques and attention to details. If you have not watched that show with Ken Brennan, that is a show worth watching. It is on CBS, it is on 60 Minutes, it is on every major investigative network and you will be able to see who the characters are that we spoke about in the story.
Francois McKinnon: Oscar, I wanted to discuss something that you and I have utilized for a long time since our career started probably. It is the use of GPS as a private investigator and today we are only going to talk in the state of Florida because there are rules. It changes by about 26 to 30 states and let us today discuss about Florida, about what the rules are, and more importantly, some funny stories that happened to us while doing investigation, utilizing GPS technology. So why do we not get started and talk about what you cannot do? I am not a lawyer, but I know this part of the law is very important because of the fact that you can infringe on people’s personal space. I think that it is important people to know a lot of new private investigators are told a lot of different stories, but the bottom line is that in Florida, which is the state where we practice originally, you cannot put a GPS tracking device on a vehicle that is not owned by yourself or your spouse or the person you are working for. Am I right?
Oscar Santamaria: That is correct. If it does not belong to the client that is hiring you, it belongs to somebody else, do not put a tracking device on that vehicle. That is a misdemeanor. I am not sure what class misdemeanor, and I do not want to know. I just do not do it. Just play by the rules and trust your surveillance skills.
Francois McKinnon: You are right about your surveillance skills. A GPS tracking device, if put legally on a vehicle, and that is the only thing we are going to do legally, is the fact that it gets you to back off from a subject. You do not have to be on them the whole time if you lose them. Specifically, when you have a one man surveillance team, you do not have a backup that can turn when they are supposed to or not. It is very important to utilize this technology if you can. I mean, if it is legal, you can back off way back because the systems that we utilize, you can literally put your phone on your windshield on the phone holder and you can see where they are. It is live 24 7, and you can see when the car turns off. You can see when the car turns back on. If anybody steps in the vehicle, it shakes the casing of the GPS tracking device and it sends you an alert. There are all sorts of ways that these GPS could be set. It could be a fencing security perimeter, which if your subject leaves five blocks or one block from where they live, you get an immediate alert as to their location, which way they are driving. It tells you the speed they are driving. It is a great investigative tool that could be used for many uses. But we are talking about legality of GPS tracking. And it is very important to follow, like you said, the rules because you could get into a lot of trouble trying to go easy and lazy on a job, slapping something on that does not belong to you. I mean, they will find it. There is a serial number on these devices. The chips that are inside these devices are trackable by law enforcement. So everything is trackable, obviously.
Oscar Santamaria: Yeah, listen, I am assuming that if they dig hard enough, that they are going to find out who the person is the owner of that GPS. That can just cause a lot of trouble. I do not know if they will actually go to that extent. Just do not commit any crimes. Obviously, if it is legal and you are able to put one on a vehicle, for sure, it is going to give you tons of information. And if it is legal, I do not understand why anybody would not. But if it is not, it is just not worth the aggravation and the trouble because you can end up getting criminal and a civil penalty because of that. Just play by the rules.
Francois McKinnon: And the technology has evolved so much for the past 10 years that now you can get through a licensed dealer because you have to go through a licensed dealer. I utilize Brickhouse Security in New York forever. And the fun part about it is that when you buy or rent a GPS device, I believe with Brickhouse you have to buy it, but they will set you up an email and an account that could last for one week or a month. They send you a link, they charge a credit card, whatever it may be, and it is not expensive at all. I think the important part is to get the live connection because some of the programs that they have is three hours later. If you are doing surveillance on a subject you want to make sure that you are going to be able to see where they are at all times. And with that said, Derek at Brickhouse Security has always taken great care of me. They have been wonderful. These devices can also be found. And I am talking about the Spark Nano, which is probably one of my favorite devices because I have used them for years and they are extremely reliable. I mean, there is a way that if there is no GPS signal, you can send the device a wake up call and it will shake the unit and get a signal. I think these are great devices. They can also be purchased, I am sure, at Amazon, Walmart. I believe in going through professionals such as Brickhouse Security. And if you do call Derek, he is a great guy and he has been taking care of me forever. Oscar, do you have any funny stories about, because people have to understand when you legally put a GPS tracking device on a vehicle, at one point the investigation is over. So it is exciting and very nerve wracking to put on the device on their vehicle the first time. More importantly, you have to retrieve the device when the job is over, or which happens often is the battery is dead of the device. And these things are sold with extended battery packs. They come in a Pelican case, waterproof, shockproof, and they are magnetic. To install them, it takes one minute. You bend over by the vehicle, you pretend to tie your shoe or look for money or whatever, you slap it on there, you are good to go. But after two or three months, you need to retrieve it. And many funny things can happen, because vehicles get serviced, they get lifted up for oil change and stuff. So you have told me you had a funny story, a weird one, so I would like to hear it.
Oscar Santamaria: I rarely employ the use of GPSs, but I have heard stories. Even though it is illegal to put it on a person’s vehicle that is not the owner, I have known of people that have done it and done it frequently. You know, Francois, everything is a numbers game. The more you do something, the greater chance you are of getting caught. And a couple of the stories I heard of these people that would do this is a lot of them would put them on because they said that between three and four in the morning, it is the best time to put these things on because there is really no activity. So they would go out really early in the morning and they would put a GPS on the vehicle, whether they worked it that day or another day. One of the people that I heard this from a friend of mine was a rather heavy set fellow and he got underneath a car, but most of these cars these days are, everything is plastic. So he was trying to find a place to put it. He was going to put it behind a gas tank or something. I really do not know. And he ended up getting stuck underneath the vehicle. He could not get out. And thank God he had it.
Francois McKinnon: I must say, I used to be a little bit chubbier and not chubby, but way back, I was in Oakland, California, and I went to retrieve a GPS tracking device at around 4 or 5 a.m. in the morning. And I dove under the car. I literally, I was with one of my associates with me, and I kind of just jumped out of the car. And we did this professionally. He pulled up, the door opened, that is blocking views from one part of the street anyways, plus the level. But I literally dove off, and my jacket, because it was cold, got caught in the frame of the car. There must have been a hook or something. First of all, I was holding both my hands, and I am pulling this bad boy out. It had six magnet cups. So we wanted to make sure it was not coming out. I was yanking at this thing, and I finally, with all my weight, I pulled it down, and I went, okay, got it. Then I went to pull back, and I am stuck under the car. Then a car is coming. It is like 5 in the morning, 4.30 in the morning. We are in Oakland, California. It was crazy. I could not get out of there. And then I am thinking, save the case, throw the GPS at the driver, and let him take off and be stuck under the car. It was the stupidest thing. My jacket got caught. I went, oh my God, what is wrong with me?
Oscar Santamaria: I know you are always taking a risk when you are putting those things on. Also, when you own your own company, your own agency, you want to get the most results possible for your clients. And sometimes you just go out of the way and just get it done. I mean, I guess some people do. I am playing by the rules. I know this was by the rule.
Francois McKinnon: It was owned by our client. The vehicle was. And I have a special form that I email to my clients, so I have them sign with the VIN number and the vehicle description to make a hundred percent sure that vehicle is owned by them.
Oscar Santamaria: Well, yeah. Well, then for sure, I would definitely put it on the GPS. It would be foolish not to.
Francois McKinnon: Oh, absolutely. And specifically, we were in California, and you have no idea the traffic that we were getting into. And with the GPS, we over these hills. We could be able to catch up and find the place, the vehicle. But it was hysterical. I am going, okay, I literally roll like Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible under the car, get there, yank the thing out, and then I get stuck under. So I ended up taking off my jacket, and I was going to leave it there. And I am going, where is my wallet, which I never, ever carry on me when I do a job because I have my IDs on it. And we took off to the destination, came back, and then we retrieved my jacket. My wallet was in my gear bags. I was sick. But just to tell you, these things are, they are funny after the fact. But when you are doing it, your heart is going through your, in my case, my jacket. I just love what we do for a living. Anyways, I wanted to tell our guests that after our break, we are going to have Mr. Mike Kalman from North Star Investigations that is going to be here to entertain us and discuss about marine surveillance. So stay tuned, and we will be right back.
Francois McKinnon: Welcome back to the show. This week, our special guest tonight is Mike Kalman from North Star Investigations. Hey, Mike, and welcome to the show.
Mike Kalman: Welcome, welcome. Thank you for having me.
Francois McKinnon: Great. We would like to hear a little bit about your background, and as well, speak a little bit about your company. How did North Star come about and all of this?
Mike Kalman: Sure, sure. So back about 1994, really started as a family thing, so to speak. My dad retired from law enforcement, looking for something to do, became a PI. At the same time, I was going towards the law enforcement route. And right at the tail end, he says, whatever makes you happy, whatever you want to do. He says, all I can tell you, though, it is not like it was in the 60s and 70s. And he says, give it a try. Give it a shot. You might like it. And I did, and I went out there totally blind, and just had a ton of fun, and I never looked back. It was a standard injury case, and I got all sorts of video, and then fun stuff. I had no clue what I was getting. Meanwhile, I had a home run case, so my very first time out, it was, oh, great job, this and that. And I was, what did I do? And it just, like I said, I never looked back. From there, it all started. I went to work for a couple of agencies and learned more, and just kind of taught myself. A lot of street smarts come with it, and that grew to the point where I said, we had an opportunity for a client, join together with him, and open up our first agency in New York. And that lasted a bunch of years, had a great time, gained some traction, and there are conferences, just went the whole gamut of honing our skills. Since then, it was a move to Florida coming up. At some point around 2009 or so, we closed the business. I came to Florida, and right around the same time, too, I started Northstar Investigations, and parted from that company, and been going strong ever since. So it was about 15, 16 years or so in New York through the crazy, chaotic streets of the city, coming down to Florida, which was a whole new animal, a little different. Same job, but a whole new animal. But that training and all that time in New York prepared me very well for Florida. Also throughout that time, did a lot of case management for some fantastic companies, honed my internal skills even more, learned more about the business, the industry, the insurance industry, and I just kept going with Northstar and then developing ever since. Till today, till current day, and I do all sorts of investigations, any really. Lately, the most important one, which has just taken off, is the marine surveillance, because I scoured the earth trying to find somebody who does this, and I accidentally bumped into it. Being an avid boater, it was just being on a case one day, and we have all been there, when you follow the person to the docks, to the ramp. Yeah, and then you go, what now? What do I do now? More so, I have to call the client and say, well, we either sit here and waste a bunch of hours till they come back. The greatest question, where are they going? What are they doing out there? And it happened to me on a case, and I just happened to be within a mile of my own marina. And I looked across the bay and I went, aha, and I ran over there and I grabbed the boat and off we went. Hours of video, and I was not dressed right for it in 95 degree weather with a pair of jeans on. So that got quite interesting out there.
Francois McKinnon: I am sure you added shorts on the boat. You added shorts, and into your gear bag, yeah. Beachwear is added to the go bag, yes. Oh, absolutely. Always. We always end up not knowing where we are going to go, and then something happens. So you always have to be prepared in your gear bag. Much more fun to do a surveillance on a boat in Florida than in a car in New York, I am assuming.
Mike Kalman: Absolutely. Absolutely. And I train investigators outside of my business and other companies too. And it is a different world now. It is a different generation. The new guys, we started in New York with what, baby beepers, dirty New York City pay phones.
Francois McKinnon: We had CB radios. I remember those things.
Mike Kalman: Radios were great. That never worked. Until we went into the subway, which of course, we decided to take a wild guess where that guy was going to end up. We worked a lot of two man teams in the city.
Francois McKinnon: Yeah, you would have to, I imagine there is doing that. But it has got to be so tough doing mobile surveillance in a city that is just bumper to bumper traffic and crazy drivers. Oh, it has got to be a nightmare.
Mike Kalman: It is absolute anarchy. And I think I have honed these skills that I have now because of that. Talk about being thrown into the fire, into the middle of chaos, and it is something I wanted or something I was always hungry for. And I said, I am going to do this, figure out the better ways of each task and roll with it. And it worked out. 30 years later, there is no sign of stopping. I just love going to work every day.
Francois McKinnon: As we do. Yeah, it is always an adventure. You never know where the day is going to take you. And there are quite a lot of stories about that.
Mike Kalman: You never know when it wind up.
Francois McKinnon: That is what I always love about our profession is the fact that you take off in the morning, early, the sun is down, the sun is about to come up, and you go and it is an adventure. And whatever you perceive in your head of what is going to happen, even though you did satellite mapping the night before, there is always something that goes wrong.
Mike Kalman: There is always something. I am talking about mapping back then in the car, there are no Google Maps and smartphones and all this fancy technology, and you are in the car with these big paper maps, right? Of course. This is how we learned the streets. And it is really an important thing that I teach anybody that wants to be taught now and any agencies that will send investigators my way. And I tell them, I said, put the smartphone to the side, put the laptop, the tablet. I said, we are going to use our eyes and our ears and keep the camera in your hand. And you are going to learn the way we learned, by focusing, by watching, putting yourself in these people’s shoes, figuring it out by really paying attention and knowing the streets, all the smart technology that can come in later. It is not handy right now because you need to learn this job. There is so much distraction now for these younger investigators out there. Unfortunately, they like to play on their phone with social media and they cannot lose focus. You cannot take your eyes off the target.
Francois McKinnon: I truly agree. And that is something Oscar and I had discussed before. I was trained by Oscar originally, and it was complete focus on the target at all times. But more importantly, was to figure out what their next move is going to be. And always anticipate and think ahead and plan and say, well, what if they go this way? What if this happens? And this, you have to have total focus and dedication about what you do and like what you do.
Mike Kalman: Absolutely. Absolutely. And in a city that included buses and trains and taxis and subways and be ready for it all. I mean, we use Metro cards and always trying to be a step ahead, like you mentioned, always trying to predict that next move, those next multiple moves and just ready to go.
Francois McKinnon: Something you mentioned about the new generation of investigators, the younger ones coming up. One thing I find and it is infuriating when you are on mobile surveillance is a lot of them do not know how the roads work. I mean, usually in most cities, there is a reasoning behind it. It is numbered. There are designations between Northeast and Northwest, especially in Miami. If it is a numbered street, you should not have to worry about your GPS. And another thing that drives me crazy is that 90% of them do not know which way North, South, East and West is. So you have to have them, especially during a two man surveillance, is you have to have a compass in the car. Sometimes they have them up in the mirror. At least have that because you are trying to explain to them, okay, I am going East on 25th Avenue or 25th Street. And they were like, well, which way is East? And it is unbelievably infuriating. At least in South Florida, East is the ocean. So we know that in South Florida. So at least we know which way North is, but you are absolutely right. It happens all the time. And I do not understand. I have a 25 year old daughter that actually travels a lot for her job, but she only uses her phone and her GPS on her phone. And we have used maps in all sorts of circumstances. At nighttime on the hood of the car with a flashlight. Now you use the phone, the cell phone light. And you do not need a map anymore.
Mike Kalman: You do not need a map anymore. And if you remember back when we started, we did not have that luxury of clicking on or on our dashboard or our phone. We had to learn those streets. We spoke directional. I am heading North on this, I am heading South on that. Meet me at the Northwest corner of this. It was natural to us. We had to learn that way. They do not have to learn this way now. These machines are telling them which way to go. This is why I train them. Pretend you do not have any of that and we are going to start and train you the way I did it. And surprising, not surprisingly, but yes, surprisingly, there is a big difference. They latch on quicker and they do not run into these trivial little problems reporting to a case manager about direction and where and location, et cetera. Once you master that, then go to your fancy devices.
Francois McKinnon: You know what I liked? What you said about how your dad was a police officer and then he went into the private investigative field and you kind of follow them in there. I always see that children often follow their parents into a given field. Mostly sons follow their father. And it is funny, my son just did the same thing recently. I really did not want him to become a private investigator, but he is actually pretty good at it and proud of him. But it is just strange how that happens.
Mike Kalman: It is. It is. We watched our dads growing up. I watched my dad growing up, big tough guy cop, and I am like, yeah, I want to be that. And he is my dad, which felt kind of weird and guilty that I did not pursue it further. This just happened to fall into it. But in a way, I still did the same thing. And I refer to it all the time and I always tell him my stories and we worked together for the first few years. So it was great. It was great.
Francois McKinnon: Oh, that is awesome. So where is your general geographical location that you do surveillance? All over Florida?
Mike Kalman: I will cover the whole state. Of course, there are some parts of the state we all know, say, the Panhandle, far up northeast or northwest, not so much northwest, but it depends on the case, of course, that the work can get subbed out as well. We do not want to drive six hours to do an eight hour surveillance, but I will pretty much go anywhere. And of course, I also advertise for New York and I have a group of investigators up there we all share. We have a network that just kind of stays in our little club and sub to each other.
Francois McKinnon: So you have actually worked where there is the most traffic ever. And then you have worked in Florida where there is a lot of traffic, but it is not like New York. Have you ever worked in rural areas?
Mike Kalman: Absolutely. Absolutely. Extreme rural areas in New York and New England and Florida. Not long after arriving, I realized there is a rural Florida. There is a rural Florida. And I wound up there a few times and I said, wow, there are cows. There are farms. I thought it was wonderful. Totally different tactics to use. And like we learned early, you have to adapt.
Francois McKinnon: Like you said earlier on about your marine surveillance, which I find fascinating because we have all been in these cases where we had to rent boats and jet skis. And Fort Lauderdale is known as the little Venice of the United States. And I mean, you know, you are familiar with the Las Olas area stretch. They are called Finger Islands. And there is like beautiful homes everywhere, but everyone has a boat. These people go out on their boats all the time. And if you are prepared properly with your knowledge and connections, you can get an advantage on a lot of other agencies that do not have this kind of special skills in boat vessels.
Mike Kalman: Right. Right. You know, there are jet skis we use too. A couple of boats of our own that are local here in the surrounding counties. And yes, I am very familiar with that area down by the Fingers and Las Olas. Everyone has boats in these gorgeous homes. And yeah, they are out all the time and there has to be a way to get to them. And it just dawned on me that day. I am usually the captain. Whoever else uses the boats is certified and licensed, et cetera. And yeah, it is to me, it is like an untouched territory. I looked around.
Francois McKinnon: I think it is genius. I think it is fantastic. How often can you get somebody going to the marina and then actually able to make the phone call and get them out there before they go out of view?
Mike Kalman: Well, locally, I know the waters very well. First off, so that helps. There is only X amount of directions they can go or do not go. If they stay any intercoastal, that is fantastic. They go out through an inlet. It may take a little more time to find them also, depending on how fast I can board the boat. But usually within a half hour locally, I am on a boat and ready to go. A little further away, say further down South Point, Lauderdale, Deerfield, even North Melbourne, Sebastian, within a half hour, 40 minutes, I can be on a boat. And I have a pretty decent… The boating up in this area is usually the intercoastal and there are three inlets. You got an idea where they are going to go.
Francois McKinnon: I have followed a few people on boats, not actually in a boat, but going out on a dock and then bye. Bye bye.
Mike Kalman: And on kayaks.
Francois McKinnon: So no, you are absolutely right. It is the worst feeling. It is a bad feeling, but you got to wait till they come back or just break off with the days. Having that in your arsenal is just a really great selling point.
Mike Kalman: Oh yeah. I reported that for a very first case to the client and I said, I got them. We are out on the water. Wait, what? She said. I said, I will update you tomorrow. You are going to love this.
Francois McKinnon: Do sometimes when they have you working a claimant that is a known boater, do they have like one of you in the water and one of you on land just in case you guys work it that way or?
Mike Kalman: No, it is just, we are kind of improvising, improvising as we are going. We have an idea. Of course, if it is a reopen, we know there is a very good chance this will happen. If they just someone who owns a boat, the highly probable and good weather days, weekends, afternoons, just have it in the game plan as a possibility and a little preliminary work and we are ready just in case.
Francois McKinnon: Having a boat and using it for your work, are you able to write it off at all?
Mike Kalman: Yeah.
Francois McKinnon: I need to get a boat. I need to get a boat and get some jobs.
Mike Kalman: Yeah.
Francois McKinnon: Yeah. Well, I am glad to hear that from the Marines. Hey Mike, we were talking earlier on and you had the funniest story that happened in your career and I am sure our audience would love, they email us and they love the fact that we tell PI stories because every time you meet people and every time I meet Russ, people always say, oh, you are a PI, you must have crazy stories. We have stories that 90% of the time we cannot even discuss. But there are some instances by changing a few things around that you can bring up, and you said you had, go ahead and tell me what you have, because I have been dying to hear this.
Mike Kalman: So yeah, it is always the question. Oh, tell us a crazy story when somebody finds out what you do. And you guys know, there are so many, and it is… So, you cannot pick. You cannot pick. And something happened today, and I was fidgeting around, and then bingo, it hit me, and I said, oh, this is a good one. So, I get a phone call. This is a private case. This is a cheater case, which I absolutely love those, because I have an arsenal of covert video that I use, and I look so forward to using it. So, I get the phone call, and it is from a gentleman whose wife is overseas, and she is going to be flying back after attending a conference, and called him and said, I am going to be a couple of days late. Things got extended. So, he was a little unalert, but then he said, this has happened before. No big deal. And I will tell you how he found out in just a little bit, which triggered the phone call to me, and we need to do surveillance, because he now knows of a new flight itinerary arrival two days past what it originally was, and it was internationals. So, I said, okay, you guys know too, whenever you are at an airport, this is always a challenge. You need two people. I did not have two. I had no one. It happened so fast, and I shot down to Fort Lauderdale. International arrivals comes right out onto the street. It is right there. So, I said, I could do this, but I did park the car in the long term parking, thinking hopefully there is a shuttle. I am going to wing it. He did not have a photo of her. This is the husband who did not have a photo to give me.
Francois McKinnon: Good relationship already.
Mike Kalman: And I says, okay, he says, but she has a very unique suitcase, and it was just bedazzled, bling bling, pink, rolling, very identifiable. So, I walk in. I am standing by the arrivals, and I am watching, watching, and I see this suitcase. I said, this has got to be her, and I have my cameras there. I filmed the whole thing, and she walked, and she is waving in my direction. I am like, God, it is not me. Walks past me, and just prior to this, the pilot had walked past me, and she walked behind me right into the arms of the pilot. I went, ooh, oh, this is okay. Okay. I followed out the door. They are doing their canoodling and stuff. Onto the shuttle, we take the shuttle to a local resort type hotel place, a very fancy, nice. I get in. I am filming the whole way. I am filming on the shuttle. I am filming pulling their suitcases. I am filming. I am just letting it run, and we get there, and I wait outside for a while. This leads to the bar downstairs by the pool. I did have a go bag on this one, so I change into my shorts, look like the tourist, and we are hanging out at the bar, and I am hearing everything that is going on. I have a little camera hidden inside of a pack of cigarettes, and I just sat on the bar and just let it film away. They are talking to me. I am talking to them, and I am playing this whole thing. I tell the client, I said, this is what is going on, and he says, oh, we got to stay. We got to stay. I said, well, there is only so long I can do this. I said, but this is going to get interesting. You might want to get me a room, so I get a room. Turns out it is on the fourth floor where they are. I get a fourth floor, and the way this setup was, I could look straight across from my balcony to their balcony. I could not see inside. You never want to film interior all the time anyway. Anything that happens on the balcony, okay, so yeah, just a bunch more footage, and just one of those cases where it just keeps happening and keeps happening, and I am like, this is great. I am getting all this, and she is just bold, so the case goes. We run it to the end. I am there for two days, and talking with the clients who are out, and I am really trying to figure out the whole time. How did he find out that she is going to be flying into Fort Lauderdale, that something might be up? She did not say she was flying to Fort Lauderdale. Sorry if I have to fix that. She is staying where she was staying and then coming home, so he comes across her itinerary prior to the phone call for me, and he is walking in his kitchen with his Google Calendar, and his smart refrigerator triggered her Google Calendar where she has her itinerary. Oh, yes. So the refrigerator gave up the cheating wife, and it sparked this whole thing, and I could not believe, but our smart technology world, of all things.
Francois McKinnon: I love the smart technology. You know what? So many people get caught up in the cloud is the thing that gets you so many times. A lot of times these husband and wives have it almost on the same thing or on the same computer, and one logs in, or one does not even know that it is on the computer, and it spills the guts. I had actually a client that it was a very big high profile domestic case in New York, and it went on for years. In any event, all these investigators were getting sued, and they needed to get the cell phone off of one of the investigators that was doing all sorts of shenanigans with the actual subject, and what he was supposed to give over his phone the day before, he said it got stolen, and he did not know where it was. They were able to go onto the iCloud of him, and oh, my God, everything, not only on that case, but on other cases that they exposed, and they ended up getting sued by millions of dollars, that company. So that stuff gets you all the time. I had another PI friend of mine who, the same thing, the husband found out that the wife had a GPS on the car, and he found it through, I do not know what it is, through either Apple, something, I think it was the cloud or whatever. So he got the actual email on his phone, and he called my friend to do one of those, the sweeps, and they found it. And the other PI got in trouble for putting it on there because the vehicle did not belong to her. It was the husband’s vehicle. So anyways, it ended up being, that stuff will always get you. So everybody, beware, beware of what you put there.
Mike Kalman: So many times, so many times. And I mean, that particular case, it was one that seemed too good to be true, because every step of the way, minute by minute, it just kept getting better and better and better. They are just not paying attention, these two. And I almost became friends with them.
Francois McKinnon: And listen, sometimes these clients have been investigated before, and the clients do not tell you. So you are going, why does a client have so much knowledge about the case? And all the time, they do not tell you. They do not want to share. They want to make sure that you are doing your job. So, and Oscar and I have lived this before, a few cases. And it is kind of disturbing, because you find out at the last minute, while you are investigating their entire case, that they know everything, because they have so much information. And like you said, you are there, you are at the hotel, you could have become buddies with them. I have done it before, and I found out everything I needed to know, everything, just by being kind and listening to them, and create a friendship and a relationship, and that they believe you. And then after you throw some drinks at them, they start talking. And it is just a matter of placing a question properly at the right spot, and they are done. Hey, Mike, I wanted to ask you, any other investigators or claim adjusters that need marine expertise, or need marine surveillance support, how can they reach you and your company?
Mike Kalman: Absolutely. So it is North Star Investigations, based out of Port St. Lucie, cover the entire state of Florida. Easiest, quickest way to reach me is my phone number, of course, 914 438 3116, email nsi.inv at gmail.com. And of course, there is a website that can be contacted there too, www.northstarinvestigation.com, it is not plural, northstarinvestigation.com.
Francois McKinnon: Okay, great. Listen, Mike, it was great having you on the show. Finally, great to see you face to face. And I would love for you to come back at some other time to be a guest on our show. And that is going to be a wrap for today’s episode of the Miami PI Chronicles. Thank you for tuning in, and be sure to join us next time. Oscar, thank you so much again. Thank you, Mike. Thank you so much.
Mike Kalman: Thank you so much.
Francois McKinnon: Bye, guys. Thank you for listening to the Miami PI Chronicles podcast. For all of your investigative needs in Florida, please contact McKinnon Investigative Group at 954 513 7414. That is 954 513 7414, or visit us at www.miginvestigations.com. Thanks again for listening, and please remember to share, follow, and like.
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